


Illusions And Expectations

by Lady_Of_Paper_7



Series: Blue To Green To Blue [3]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Asgard (Marvel), Bifrost, Character Development, Communication Failure, Established Relationship, Family, Happy Ending, M/M, No crack, Reconciliation, References to Norse Religion & Lore, Relationship Development, Running Away, Shapeshifting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-05
Updated: 2018-07-21
Packaged: 2019-05-02 17:14:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 22,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14549475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Of_Paper_7/pseuds/Lady_Of_Paper_7
Summary: Shapeshifting could be divided into several basic kinds. (And sometimes even experienced mages ended up making mistakes whilst changing from one form into the other)(You do not have to have read the other parts of the series to read this)





	1. Shapeshifting

**Author's Note:**

> I have to admit that neither the fic itself nor the idea behind it, Loki messing up shifting from one form into the other, can be described as 'recent'. It does, however tie in nicely with my "Breathing Under Water"-series and provides an actual reason, why neither Thor, Tony or Loki were present during the Winter-Soldier-Affair (and I finally wanted to get it out of my head). I really hope you'll enjoy this and can promise you, that this one will not drift off into crack or too much unnecessary drama or clichés. Thank you for reading!
> 
> If you don't care for this kind of story-line, I totally get that and would advise you to skip this one and just read "Byproduct of Life" if you want to continue reading about Loki and Tony's relationship or are just in the mood for some non-traumatic Stucky without Civil War-spoilers.

Shapeshifting could be divided into several basic kinds. The easiest one to both conjure and maintain, glimmers, were mere illusions which a shifter could simply wrap around their own body as long as their concentration would not be broken. As easy as they were to handle, as easily could they be disturbed or unwound and could not withstand even the slightest of touches.

Outward tailoring changed only the _outward_ appearance of someone –including voice and clothing if necessary - but would resist physical disturbances and did not require the full concentration of the sorcerer even though it relied on a constant power flow which it drew from said mage; once the appearance was changed, it stayed the same until the spell was actually dissolved or the shifter grew too weak to keep sustaining it.

Complete shifts changed the entire anatomy – both in- and outward – and could be numbered among the hardest disciplines of shapeshifting. It also took the longest to master and the most energy and power to work but it only required that power during the shift itself though.

All three kinds – along with several other ones – could not only be applied to the mage’s own body but could also be used on other individuals and Loki, of course, had mastered the entire spectrum centuries ago. It had also proven to be one of the most useful abilities he’d achieved in his life, as well as one of the most entertaining ones - especially since he’d gotten together with Tony Stark who cherished his abilities in general. And yet, it had also provided the couple with several interesting opportunities, like the time Loki had tailored himself to look like his boyfriend and vice versa – it was unnecessary to mention that the rest of S.H.I.E.L.D., including Fury yearned for the days when the trickster had not been allowed to make use of his powers.

But most importantly, Loki’s ability to change his appearance to fit whatever circumstances required him to allowed them to – more or less - openly be with each other without having to worry about public riots concerning the relationship of an avenger and alleged super villain who had tried to take over the city three years ago. They’d only used it a couple of times when they’d gone out however, until Tony couldn’t keep putting off an international conference, where he had to speak on behalf of Stark Industries and which would last for about three weeks.

Since both, he and Loki, had agreed that the god would not stay in Manhattan on his own, the solution to this problem had been fairly easy. It had also been the reason Tony Stark had arrived in Paris in the company of a stunningly beautiful woman who had been, until then, completely unheard of. Quite strangely, despite the fact that no one seemed to be able to tear their eyes away from her bright green eyes, which stood out against her fair skin and the waterfall of long, pitch black hair that cascaded down her back down to her slim hips, no reporter or security system seemed to be able to take a proper photo of her which wasn’t grainy or her blurred.

___

“Our three weeks are up, darling”, Loki retraced the outline of her boyfriend’s lips with the tip of her thumb, long black curls tumbling down her shoulder as she tilted her head to the side, “or almost up at least. So the question is; what would you like us to do tonight?”

She was sitting next to Tony on the hotel bed prettily, legs pressed together and bent at the knee, her other hand between the two of them on the mattress and supporting her upper body as she bent over the engineer. Loki had not changed back into her usual, male, form yet either and the engineer’s hands were cupping her waist and upper thigh, pushing the dark green skirt of her dress up as he moved his hand higher.

“So you’re letting me decide?”, a lazy smile stretched across Tony’s lips as he eased her back against the crisp white sheets, her long legs settling on either side of his hips. Her black stockings stood out against the white sheets and her pale skin while the heels she’d worn all evening now laid somewhere near the door of their suite where she’d kicked off her feet when they’d first entered the room.

“Apparently”, Loki too grinned up at him and by the time she’d finished blinking, her dress and stockings had vanished and all Tony could see was milk white skin, green eyes and charcoal colored curls and he involuntarily licked his lips at the sight. Three weeks had not nearly been enough time to get used to it.

“Well”, the engineer ducked his head to press his lips against the hollow between his lover’s collarbones as he smoothed one hand further up her thigh. Then he continued his way down to her navel, trailing kisses down her sternum and smirked at the quiet gasps that escaped Loki’s full red lips every time Tony’s lips made contact with her soft skin, “as much as I’ve enjoyed this”, his fingers finally reached the very base of her leg, brushing along the crease of her thigh and drawing another sigh from her lips, “I do miss seeing your real face”

“That’s”, Loki started with a soft smile but while the engineer had been talking he’d also started nudging her thighs apart and she broke off with a loud gasp when Tony finally did slipped his fingers in between her thighs, “s-sweet of you”

“You know me, honey”, Tony crooked his fingers while he pressed a kiss against her left hipbone when she moaned out loud and clutched onto the sheets, “You can – ah!- hold off one more night for me?”

“Mhm, I think I’ll manage”


	2. Dark Ages

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Four months later

Sometimes Loki found himself despising Midgard, even though his boyfriend spent the majority of his time saving the planet and he himself had been accompanying him and his team on their missions more often than not since they’d gotten together as well. As of late he hadn’t exactly been feeling well though, suffering from headaches, dizziness, stomach cramps and nausea and it wasn’t getting better; he could feel his surroundings, the very air he breathed, drawing onto him, sucking at his energy.

That happened sometimes when he overstrained his powers (while he wasn’t on Asgard) and there had been several attacks on smaller cities in the area lately. It almost seemed like every petty fiend the avengers had made during the last years had decided to simply wear them out with countless smaller strikes.  

“I hate your planet”, he told Tony when his lover entered the room with a tray in his hand, pressing the heel of hand against his lower stomach as he rolled onto his side and buried his face in the pillows. He wasn’t quite sure why his apparent exhaustion – he may or may not tended to strain himself when they were on a mission in order to protect Tony more that was strictly necessary  - had manifested like this this time and not, like usually, in the severe migraines he was generally  prone to.

“I know, Lokes”, Tony bent over him, covering the hand on his stomach with his own and brushed his hair back with his free hand, “I brought you some of the tea you like and apples – if you lose any more weight, we’ll have to tie you to the ground so you don’t get blown off your feet the next time someone breaths into you general direction”, he added on second.

When he felt sick, the god tended to live strictly on water or tea and fruit – the fancy organically farmed sort Tony bought when he wasn’t well as he seemed to tolerate that better than processed food.

“What time’s it?”, he ignored Tony, as well as the food, and rubbed his other hand over his face.

He hadn’t even bothered leaving their bed today; he’d only end up there or on a couch again anyway, curled up around the pang in his stomach and he was sick of snarling at people who kept wandering through their floor for their team meetings, which for some reason tended to take place at their place, and commented on him slouching in one of Tony’s threadbare shirts and shorts. They should be glad that he was even bothering with those, Loki thought to himself when the clothes stuck to his skin unpleasantly. He always felt like he was burning up these days and that didn’t help with the nausea one bit.

“Just after 11 a.m.”, Tony twirled one long black streak around his finger and brushed a kiss against his temple.

Their dark sheets were sticking to his sweat slick skin where it was directly touching the gray silk and it looked so pale in the semi-darkness of their bedroom it almost looked like it was glowing, “but it’s the most boring day ever, you’re not missing anything”

“Would you tell me if I were?”

“Of course”

“I don’t believe that for a second”, Loki turned his head towards his boyfriend and blinked up at him with dark green eyes.

“Hey, would I be here if there was something going on?”, the engineer sat down behind him on the edge of their bed and bent over him with one hand supporting himself against the mattress next to his shoulder.

“You tend to be astonishingly stupid from time to time”

“Well, how do you think did we get  _here_?”   

“You’re such an…”, Loki started but cut himself off with a low moan and closed his eyes again.

“Yeah, yeah, I know”, he chuckled, “but  _you_  know-“

“Don’t start with that again”

“I didn’t say anything”

“I’m not seeing one of your butchers who wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between an aesir and a horse”

Aisir, Jotun; it didn’t really matter here and Loki had no intention of going into  _that_  right now. Tony didn’t show whether he’d picked up on his lover’s sloppy phrasing, or what he thought about it if he had, anyway. His boyfriend really was a lot sweeter than he deserved, the trickster caught himself thinking from time to time.

“Firstly, these highly trained and capable people are doctors, as you know, and secondly; if I remember a certain story about you correctly, sometimes there isn’t that big a difference between you and-“

“If you finish that sentence, I will turn you into a fern and give you to Clint for his next birthday.”

“I don’t think he’d accept any kind of gift from you”

“Maybe I’d just set you on fire then”

“Oh, but you’d miss me after a couple of hours, I’m sure of it. Anyway-”

“I am not going to see a doctor, Anthony”, Loki sighed and was suddenly very glad that Tony currently had several meetings he needed to attend and wouldn’t have the time to keep coddling him constantly. And that he hadn't seen him throw up earlier that day.

“What about Banner?”, Tony kept pushing and his boyfriend made a sound between a sigh and a growl.

“ _No_ ”

“Come on, why not? You know, he’s capable and he can deal with your…being aesir”

“I know what’s wrong and I also know that there isn’t really anything to be done; I just have to wait till it gets better”

“You know, there are times I really can believe that you literally were raised during the dark ages”

“Tony…”, Loki squeezed his fingers and forced one corner of his mouth upwards, “it’s no big deal, I’ll be just fine. You just have to trust me”, he said softly, “and we shouldn’t forget the fact that you’re doing more stupid things on a daily basis and I have to deal with that”

“So you’d let someone check on you if I stopped doing stupid shit?”

“Definitely”, Loki gently pulled him down and kissed his cheek, “but you won’t do that, love, and we both know it.”

“I haven’t done a single thing today that was-“

“Your shirt’s singed at its hem”, he pointed out with fond smile and let go of Tony, “and I’m feeling better anyway, you don’t have to worry.”

“I haven’t stopped worrying about you, since you first showed up at my place”, the engineer sighed and got up, “I’ll be back in a couple of hours and you’ll stay here and rest, okay?”

“Just when I wanted to go climb a mountain”

“Put on a jacket then”, Tony tugged on one leg of his pants before he turned towards the door, “but keep the shorts”

“Jackass”, Loki called after him but did reach for the tea-cup on his nightstand.

“You know, you love it”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you like it, thank you for reading!
> 
> I'll try to keep up the weekly updates.


	3. Bound To Happen

Some life-changing events aren’t accentuated by dramatic speeches and glorious music.

“Shit”

Sometimes the sound of a calendar hitting the floor is enough.

“Oh, no, no, no, not now”, Loki kept yanking his fingers through his hair as he paced round and round through the room he’d stayed in when he’d first moved into the tower before he and Tony had gotten together.

He still regularly spent time in there, usually when he couldn’t sleep or bear company but had turned it into his own little library by filling the old room with the antique tomes and scrolls Thor had brought back for him from Asgard and the books Tony kept giving to him. Now, however, he stopped pacing through it in favor for slumping backwards against a free space between the shelves and covered his face with his hands; “Why now? I don’t need this”, he let himself slide down against the wall and allowed his head to fall forward against his knees.

It had been about four months since his and Tony’s trip to France, about two weeks since he’d started feeling unwell and the third day he’d started by getting sick -which virtually had been more than enough to confirm his conjectures; gods and goddesses usually didn’t just catch stomach flues or something like that but he’d still double-checked the dates, only to discover that everything was like the last time he’d been with child. He hadn’t actually been all that surprised either; he always knew when he was pregnant and he never admitted it to himself until he absolutely had to and was no longer able to put it off.

He’d barely finished the last word when he went still and straightened up again; “I didn’t mean that”, he whispered, one hand settling on his still flat belly, “ _I didn’t_ , I promise”

He kept brushing his hand over his stomach, his feet sliding forward against the reddish parquet and his second hand joined the other, moving in slow little circles against his tunic while he blankly starred into space, “you just surprised me, that’s all. I didn’t expect this- you to happen, I’m sorry”

Although, who was he kidding? This had been bound to happen and it had taken him long enough to finally get it as well; that it wasn’t circumstances or exhaustion that had him feeling like crap but morning-sickness and his body changing to adjust to the child. He should have been more careful, he knew that, had known it when he’d first shifted into female form to accompany his boyfriend on his trip but being with Tony sometimes tended to make him forget to be careful, to be responsible, to keep his guard up.

Maybe it was a good thing the penny had finally dropped after Tony had been called away with the rest of the team for another mission - it had been a pain to get him to leave as well, Loki reflected as he buried his bare toes in the rug in front of him; the engineer never left his boyfriend when he was worried about him and it had taken the other avengers to chime in and point out that he kind of still had a responsibility as Iron Man and that Loki was well capable of staying in bed on his own for a couple of hours.

He exhaled again, closing his eyes and worrying his bottom lip between his teeth. Then he got up. Tony would be back soon and there was a lot he had to do till then.

____

_“I’m sorry._

_I made a mistake._

_Don’t worry._

_Thank you for everything._

_Farewell”_

Tony read and re-read the words over and over. He’d gone back to their bedroom to check on his boyfriend as soon as he’d taken off his suit after he’d come back but instead of the god, he’d found a letter on the nightstand, his name written across its front in Loki’s neat lettering. He hadn’t been able to put it down since he’d read the first word.

“What do you mean ‘don’t worry’”, he heard his own constrained voice, “you only ever say that when you _know_ something’s wrong”

His hand was shaking so badly, the words blurred before him and he finally dropped the letter onto the floor. The words had burned themselves into his brain anyway.

“Jarvis, when did Loki leave?”

“ _He asked me not to save any data concerning his departure_ ”

So there was absolutely nothing; if Loki had asked Jarvis to delete everything, there was no chance, the AI hadn’t done it. He would never double-cross the god, just like he’d never betray Tony.

“Of course he did”, Tony felt like his surroundings had been put on mute and he could feel his heart speeding up, his breath coming out in fast, erratic pants, “when did he ask you to do that?”

“ _You know him better than that, Sir_ ”, Jarvis retorted but his voice missed its usual edge, “ _he did, however, wanted me to tell you that it was his decision to go, that he wasn’t threatened in any way and no one made him leave_ ”

“But he didn’t tell you why”

“ _Sir, please try to calm down, I am sensing-_ “

“Shut up”, Tony snapped, “shut up, shut up, _shut up_ ”

“Okay, here’s what we’ll do”, he continued after a couple of seconds, “I’ll go down to my lab and you’ll boot up every monitor before I get there”

“ _As you say, Sir_ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


	4. Composure

Loki silently cleared his throat as he walked towards his brother; “Thank you for coming here”, he folded down the collar of his coat to give his hands something to do.

“Of course, Loki”, Thor had turned to face him as soon as he’d noticed his arrival and showed him a bright smile before he noticed his haunted expression and asked; “what is it?”

“I need your help”, Loki too stepped up in front of the railing of the bridge they’d agreed to meet on, “I’m sorry, I would not have bothered you to come here if-“

“You stop that now and tell me what’s up, alright?”, his brother raised his hand to put it on his shoulder but let it sink down before it actually made contact.

A couple of years ago, he wouldn’t have thought twice about touching the younger god – he didn’t hesitate now for a lack of willingness either but it had taken a considerable amount of time until Loki had even been able to tolerate being in the same room as him without breaking down or freaking out after he’d been saved and Thor didn’t feel like pushing his luck now after his little brother had asked him for help by unnecessarily forcing physical contact onto him.

“I have to leave Midgard”

“Did something happen between you and Stark? Did he hurt you or-“

“No”, Loki cut him off, his shoulders tensing up, “no, he didn’t, that’s not it”

“But you put so much effort in staying here and I thought you were happy with-“

“That’s not the point, Thor, I just - I have to leave as soon as possible”

“Don’t get me wrong but if there’s anyone in these nine realms who can move between them as he pleases it’s you, Loki”, Thor rested his lower arms on the railing and let himself fall forward a bit whilst looking at his brother, “And I know you didn’t call me here just to say goodbye“, Loki had called him an hour ago to ask him to meet up and had stressed to not tell any member of the avengers about it, especially not Tony, “so what are you up to?”

“I’m pregnant, Thor”, Loki whispered as he pulled his black coat tighter around himself, “I fucked up and-“

“Does Tony know?”

“No, he doesn’t and neither you nor I am going tell him. I’ll just have to-”

“So you’re going to keep this from him? I don’t think-“

“I can’t tell him, don’t you understand that? Thor, this isn’t normal”, Loki swallowed silently, “at least here it’s not”, he finished even more softly and met his brother’s gaze openly for the first time and Thor sighed, shaking his head, “I can’t do that to him”

“And how exactly can I help you?”

“I don’t want to use one of the passages while I’m- I mean, they’re safe enough for me but I wouldn’t use them right now if I don’t absolutely have to”

“I’ll take you home then”

“I don’t think that’s where I should go”

“Well, it’s the only place I know you’ll be safe so you’ll either go to Asgard or you’ll stay right here”

Loki raised his chin and held Thor’s gaze for several minutes, jaw and shoulders set but it had been clear that he wouldn’t budge from the second he’d finished speaking.

“Alright”, his shoulders sacked forward and he turned his face back towards the skyline.

“You probably want to leave right away I take it?”, Thor asked and Loki managed a weak smile.

“That would be great, thank you”, he whispered and, without allowing himself to think about it, he backed away from the railing and wrapped his arms around Thor.

“It’s alright”, Thor muttered as he carefully hugged Loki close, “as long as you know what you’re doing”

“I do”, Loki said solemnly as he pulled back and took one last look at his surroundings, “believe me I do”

 

_\-------_

 

Only a couple of minutes had passed since Loki and Thor had arrived on their home planet and since Thor had let go of his brother. Travelling via the bifrost was about the safest way to travel between the nine realms but he’d still wrapped both arms tightly around the younger god before he’d asked Heimdall to take them home in order to shield him from the bifrost’s powers that had pulled at them while they’d travelled and had kept steadying him when the trickster’s knees had almost given in when they’ finally arrived. His skin had been covered in a thin layer of sweat and he’d squeezed his eyes shut while he’d slung one arm around his middle and pressed the other’s hand over his mouth.

Loki had shuddered at the mere thought of having taken one of the secret passages as he’d only managed to support himself by holding onto his brother’s shoulder, fighting back the sickness that was burbling in the very pit of his stomach and threatening to overtake him. As soon as he’d been able to stand on his own feet without running risk of fainting after all or barfing onto the bridge, they had made for the main hall where Loki now stood in front of the king, Thor hovering at his side and the queen next to her husband. Apart from a handful of guards, no one but the royal family was present as its youngest member straightened his back and focused his eyes on the god and goddess who’d pretended to be his parents for almost his entire life;

“I know, I have no right to ask this of you”, he paused for just a second but kept his voice even and clear, “and I know it’s because of a mistake I made, I am in this situation”, the word felt like acid in his mouth but this was probably the easiest way of begging the queen and king for this. He was saying apology after apology in his mind as he spoke.

Both his arms were protectively wrapped around his middle at this point but more because he needed at least a small reassurance than him explaining the ‘situation’ he was in – there was no chance they didn’t already know about the baby, having been told by Heimdall or because the allfather had found out himself – so he didn’t see the point in dwelling on the situation - the “mistake”, he’d made whilst shifting from one form into the other - out loud, “but I am in desperate need for a safe place to stay for the following months”

Odin didn’t say a word as he regarded the young god in front of him like he was a riddle he could solve by dissecting it with his gaze and Frigga’s fingers where continuously twining and twirling around one another in front of her skirts, her eyes too trained on Loki but opposed to the king, she was examining the paleness of his skin and the way he carried himself; back straight and body locked behind the arms he had wrapped around himself.

“Look, I know you don’t owe me anything”, his voice had a more raw edge to it when the silence stretched on, “and I’m not trying to lay claim to anything either”, he stopped again, his dizziness worsening with every second the allfather observed him in silence and he could, no matter how hard he tried, not fight the anger that had settled alongside the sickness in his stomach or the shame that crawled hot-red up his neck; it wasn’t fair that he lost his love due to his own stupidity and now had to resume begging Odin, of all people, for shelter until he’d have the child and the two of them would be strong enough to travel on.

He didn’t see Frigga’s expression change as he fixed his own gaze onto the floor in front of him, “If you want me to beg”, he went on in a rather hollow sounding tone of voice before he squeezed his eyes shut and sunk to his knees on the ancient floor tiles, “you can have it, I’m not above that as you well know”, the second half of his sentence was as bitter as it was unbidden when it came out and Loki made himself inhale and exhale once in a weak attempt to regain his composure, “just please, if you ever, just for a second, have truly cared about me, allow me to stay until I can safely travel to another realm, it doesn’t matter where-”

This time he could see Frigga biting her bottom lip while her husband stayed perfectly still out of the corner of his eye but didn’t catch the exact moment she made her decision; “Thor will see you to your chambers right away”, she didn’t whisper as she nodded at her older son, daring to show them a small smile. The king didn’t turn his head toward her and didn’t utter a word of objection but Loki didn’t miss him pursing his lips and his eye darting to the side for a second, “and you will be absolutely safe while you are staying here”, she added, “for as long as you want to stay”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you very much for reading, I hope you've enjoyed this and that it didn't get too cheesy. If you'd let me know, whether there was something you liked or didn't, that would be lovely but you don't have to of course <3 
> 
> Lots of love!


	5. These Days

One thing Loki had always loved about his old chambers were the heavy drapes that framed the windows. They were a dark, beautiful shade of emerald that kept out all lights if he felt like it and pulled them shut completely. He also remembered hiding behind them from when he and Thor had been little and had played together and setting them on fire once after he’d gotten frustrated whilst practicing spells. Right now, they were half opened, lazily swaying in the afternoon breeze, and he himself was curled up in the middle of the same bed he’d slept in when he’d lived in the palace; back when he’d still believed that he was part of the royal family, his face half buried in the silks and velvets and his arms clutching a couple of pillows to his chest, a lousy substitute for the lover he’d left behind on Midgard.

The chambers were overlooking the court and gardens of the palace and the sun was setting in a pale orange on the darkening sky. It was his third day on Asgard - his first week back home and he already felt like he was going crazy. He’d done the right thing, he was sure of it and yet he was miserable. His missing Tony felt like someone had cut off one of his limbs.

He was aware of how ridiculous he was being as well which didn’t help; it hadn’t even been a full week since he’d last seen the engineer but, then again, it wasn’t really about how long it had been but the fact that he’d probably never see Tony again, like he’d decided was best for both - all three of them. After all, sneaking off to see- have a look at him right  now, or any time before he’d have the baby would be obviously stupid and his last trip via bifrost had been enough for the god in his current state and meeting up with him afterward… that would probably just end up hurting both of them. It’s not like Loki could just store the child somewhere else while he moved back in with Tony and pretended the last months didn’t happen. It’s not like he wanted to return to him on that condition either. _Just stop looking back and start over, you’ve done it before. Just stop looking back and-_

“This is just perfect”, he sighed as he twisted onto his back, stretching out his legs and arms across almost the entire length of the bed. It was really kind of amazing that they’d given him his old rooms; he’d much rather expected Odin to either tell him to get lost or lock him up in an abandoned cell. He’d never realized how beautiful these rooms actually were when he’d still lived here. He had not realized a lot of things back then.

“We’ll only stay here as long as we absolutely have to, you hear that?”, he added after some time, absentmindedly touching the tips of his fingers to his belly.

He was constantly doing that as of late, just couldn’t help it – he already felt like he couldn’t wait as much as another second to finally see and hold his and Tony Stark’s child, to kiss its sweet face and tiny feet, to touch the soft hair and hold those little hands and fingers in his.

He also felt less sick already and his headaches had nearly vanished almost as soon as he’d returned to Asgard - just from a physical point of view, he was definitely feeling better. The main reason for that consisted in him having also changed his anatomy again, only this time he’d made sure to adjust his body to suite his and the child’s needs rather than please anyone with his appearance. It’s not like anyone could actually _see_ his true appearance with the glimmer he’d conjured after he’d changed.

Anyone but Frigga, Thor and the group of healers and priestesses, the queen had asked to look after his physical state, that is. He’d pondered whether he should already wear the glimmer constantly or not; as long as he was dressed, or at least wearing (loose) pants, he looked pretty much the same as always, apart from his hips, which looked wider, but he’d decided that it was probably easier, or at least less suspicious, if his looks didn’t change as long as he was on Asgard. Just because the Aesir were more used to his weirdness, didn’t mean he was dying to listen to their comments. It might even be fun to see their reaction to the baby’s sudden appearance in a couple of months. The two of them would be gone before anyone could really bother them anyway.

“Maybe we could visit from time to time if you’d like us to”, he closed his eyes for a couple of seconds and sighed again, “we’ll only go where we want, just you and me”, he bit his lower lip and blinked, “and we won’t let anyone tell us what we’re supposed to do, absolutely no one.”

 

\--

 

The queen was always wringing her hands when she was nervous, always had done that and she couldn’t, for the life of her, keep from doing it for more than a couple of minutes before she reverted into the small movements again without even noticing it at first. She didn’t try and cross her arms or fold her fingers now, nor did she force her arms to hang stiffly at her sides after she’d knocked on the door to his chambers for the first time in months, only having visited them from time to time since the whole of Asgard had believed Loki dead, fallen from the bifrost and –

She had, however, made sure the rooms were kept in perfect order, never allowing anyone else to take care of that or even enter the rooms but herself, Thor and her husband. Odin had only visited them once, on the night after they’d lost Loki, or believed they had and she had not said a word for days after that and had not been able to get out of bed either. After that she’d spent every minute, trying to be there for Thor, but had kept other social interaction to a bare minimum, every day spent in mourning attire and solitude.

Until, one day, Thor had returned from Midgard and she had learned that Loki was still alive and what had happened to him after his literal fall. After a couple of months he’d even told her that Loki had fallen in love with genius Midgardian inventor and hero Tony Stark who had saved him. She had assumed that she would never see him again but as long as he was safe and, from what she heard, even happy with the partner he’d found, she could live with that, made herself be able to live with that.

Three days ago, both her sons had appeared on the bridge though.

“I’m sorry”, Loki now silently cleared his throat, “I didn’t expect you to”, he didn’t blink or rub his eyes but he looked almost as worn out as he had three days ago, “I didn’t expect to see you tonight” Or ever after she’d already permitted him to stay here. That probably meant they were even.

He had never really taken to talking any more than absolutely necessary when he felt out of his depth – at least not when he was talking to someone who might actually be able see through his pretending - and as he hovered there, body half shielded behind the door, Frigga eventually settled for a simple; “may I come in?”, and followed him through the door and half of the room after he’d stepped back and sat down on one of the divans that stood in front of the windows.

“Are you satisfied with your rooms?”, Frigga placed her hand on the cushion beside here, gesturing for him to sit down as well.

“I wouldn’t have expected you to keep everything like it was before…”, he trailed off whilst sinking down near the other end of the settee.

Long legs never seemed as big a disadvantage until one tried to sit on the very edge of a low liege without looking too obviously awkward whilst doing so. Loki’s back was cutting a straight line against the orange light, his arms locked in front of him once he’d settled down beside the queen. Her face fell for just a second when he raised his chin the tiniest bit, his own face and jaw set. The same mask he’d worn around Thor’s friends and the majority of Asgard’s warriors but never around her.

They used to have such a good relationship when he and Thor had been little, the queen pursed her lips for just a second; he’d always come to her when something had been wrong, had known that she would always be there for him, no matter what but he’d become so quiet as he’d grown up, always cut off from virtually everyone else, always so angry at anyone, first of all himself.

He had not once come to her directly when he’d found out about his true heritage, had only once spoken to her while they’d sat at Odin’s bedside. She should have tried harder to get him to talk to her, should not have been as absent-minded and with her heart still with her other son exiled on Midgard, should never have let it come this far at all; him finding out on his own and confronting Odin while Thor still had been banished – everything that could have gone wrong had gone wrong and he’d gone through so much ever since. Thor had, by no means told her everything that had happened to Loki after he’d fallen from the bifrost but the way he was carrying himself now, his face constantly schooled into a blank expression and body tense even as he sat beside her, told her more than enough.

“Which was very kind of you”, he said very carefully. It was almost funny; him speaking nearly every language of the nine worlds and yet he found no words to finish his answer and swallowed drily, “your grace”

He’d never called the queen by her first name, had actually never even thought about her as anything but his mother; finding out about his true nature had been a shock and realizing that he didn’t belong to his supposed family any longer, had never properly belonged to them in the first place, had just taken over and he’d completely lost it, virtually until he’d woken up in a make-shift sick room at S.H.I.E.L.D.s, his body and mind broken and weak but, for the first time in months, his own again.

All he had been able to think about had been that Odin had lied to him for all his life whilst keeping him more like a pet/weapon than child, never mind his own son and his relationship with Thor had become more and more strained as they’d grown up anyway. Until Loki had almost killed him.

Maybe, just maybe there had been a hint of relieve as he’d finally gotten a proper explanation why he had never really fit in with them, why he’d never been able to keep up with his supposed brother and why there had been this – for a lack of better word - barrier between himself and the allfather, not that that had helped him right when his world had broken down around him. It had been different with his mother – adoptive mother, he reminded himself -though; losing her had been too big for him to even think about properly so he’d just shoved every thought about her and his home away.

Until now, that is. He should have let go properly four years ago, he thought now when his chest and throat felt tight and he fought the urge to just scream at her to leave him alone and lock himself up and away for the up-coming months – sitting here and pretending he’d come to terms with everything (like he should have by now – why couldn’t he just deal with this like a normal person and finally leave it behind?) just hurt, hurt so badly, he felt like he couldn’t breathe. 

“Please don’t do this, Loki”

“I didn’t mean to offend”

“That’s not what I meant”, she laid her hand on his forearm and Loki just barely kept from jerking it out of her reach right then; he didn’t want her to be nice to him like this, to pretend like there were still family when every second he looked at her, old wounds felt like they were being opened up again and every thought and memory he’d repressed flooding back into his mind. All he wanted was being left alone and pretend that all of this had never happened - he’d excelled at telling this to himself since he’d been freed from the Chitauri’s control and being around Tony and the other Avengers had worked wonders with taking his mind of those memories, “you know that”

You would expect that being able to always tell when someone was lying, would make everything easier but Loki just barely managed to not lose control over his expression; “of course”, his voice sounded more bitter than monotone now, “ _I always do_ ”

His face was set in stone and his entire body was so tensed up, you could almost see his muscles fighting to stay still while the queen’s lips opened slightly but didn’t utter a single word. She tried to catch his gaze but wasn’t even sure he was seeing her with the way he was staring straight ahead and more past her than actually at her. So she closed her own eyes for just a second, tried to bring her own thoughts into order and took a deep breath before she whispered his name again.

“What I’d like to tell you”, she said when he didn’t show another reaction, “what I should tell you, is that I know what you feel and that everything is going to be alright”, she went on just as quietly, “but I won’t do that because I _don’t know_ , how you feel”, Loki didn’t even blink and she didn’t add ‘because you never tell me these days’, “I do, however know, what it feels like to lose my youngest child, to lose part of my family”

“How could you?”, Loki did actually return her gaze this time, “the _one_ son you have is alive and well and probably still on Asgard”, he turned his head and pointedly looked away, “you should probably just go talk to _him_ ”

“If you would just let me explain-“, she tried again but this time he did pull his arm out of her grip and crossed both of them in front of him again.

“I don’t want your explanations”, later he would be amazed that he had not yelled these words but he didn’t think that her expression could have been more pained if he had, “I don’t want to know why you lied and put on this masquerade, I don’t want to talk about anything with you”, his voiced quivered ever so slightly, “it hurts just thinking about all of this and _I don’t want to hurt anymore_ ; if it had been up to me I wouldn’t even be here now”

“I know that and I know it hurts”, Frigga didn’t make a move to get up, “but the pain won’t just go away if you keep trying to run away from it”

“I had it under control just fine”, he snapped but a crack had appeared in the mask he’d schooled his face into and as it spread further with every word he said and, just like that, the god of mischief and chaos, of fire and menace was gone; “you don’t need to pretend like you care now, I didn’t ask you to and I don’t need you to either”, his chest rising and falling in abrupt bouts, “it obviously was a mistake coming here and I’ll leave as soon as-“, the reflection of entire room fit into his eyes. His lips turned white as he pressed them together and his fingers clutched and pulled at the fabric of his black tunic, opening and closing and knotting together in his lap until Frigga reached out one hand to gently lay it over his again and he didn’t finish his sentence but squeezed his eyes together and fought to keep from completely losing control and starting to cry when she closed both hands around his and squeezed his fingers.

“Oh, my sweet boy”, she whispered and smoothed her thumbs over his knuckles when Loki didn’t back away again, couldn’t bring himself to, “why did everything have to be so hard on you?”, she sighed again when he shrugged with one shoulder and looked at the far corner of the room. He didn’t make a sound while his shoulders started shaking harder, “I never wanted this to happen to you and I know this comes too late”, she inclined her head in an attempt to catch his gaze again, “but please let me be there for you now”

When her sons had been little, she had always known what to say, how to kiss scrapped knees better and sooth them back to sleep after nightmares. As they had grown up it had become harder and harder to find the right words and keep the connection between her and her children intact for when they’d need her again.

Once the first sob pushed past his lips, Loki lost it completely and didn’t even try to fight the queen gently tugging him closer until he laid his forehead against her shoulder and she gently cradled him in her arms like she had done when he’d still been a small child. He was slightly horrified at how much pain he actually still felt; he’d hoped, he’d left all of this behind when he’d gotten together with Tony, had told him about these things, had believed to have worked through them simply by giving it time and stop thinking about it. Maybe it had just been gone while they’d been together, or rather, while he’d been distracted, being happy and all, being stupidly in love.

“Shhh”, she whispered, when he cried harder, “from the very second I saw you and held you in my arms you’ve been my son, Loki and that has not changed or is ever going to change, I promise you that. I know you are hurt and it’s our, my fault but you have to believe me, we never meant for all of this to happen, not like it did. We never meant to hurt you”

She kept holding him close until his sobs became quieter again and then carefully eased him down to curl up on the settee with is head in her lap, twirling his curls around her fingers and quietly humming an old nursery rhyme while the sun went down completely and he dozed off. She stayed right there until the next morning’s sunrise dyed the sky outside a light shade of pink, only moving when she reached for a blanket and covered her son with it  and Loki slept a lot better than he had since he’d returned to Asgard.


	6. In A Second

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two months later

There was a knock on the door.

There was a knock on the door of Loki’s chambers and it wasn’t his mother who was knocking. When Loki had been younger, he’d placed a number of spells on the entrances of his chambers which prevented certain people from entering them when he wasn’t in and let him know, who wanted to come in when he was and right now it was Thor who was rapping his knuckles against the dark polished wood. A sharp crease appeared between the trickster’s eyebrows as he dropped his book into his lap, his fingers turning into a bookmark between the pages.

“What do you want?”, he called while he stretched one leg out across the mattress. He’d been sitting cross-legged as usual, as that was about the most comfortable position he could settle into with the swell of his belly having increased noticeably during the last weeks and now both his ankles as well as the muscles in his upper and lower legs ached dully.

“It’s”, his brother started but the tone of his voice was enough for Loki to, kind of awkwardly, push himself up against the pillows behind him and wave the doors open from where he sat before Thor had finished saying ‘important’. He splayed his fingers across his belly but he didn’t get up yet.

“What is this?”, his voice was flat when Thor entered the room, carrying an unconscious Tony Stark over his right shoulder.

“Brother, calm down it’s not-“, he closed the distance between himself and the younger god’s bed before said younger god could go on freaking out and laid the engineer down beside him on the sheets.

“I”, Loki hissed through his teeth and would have pushed Thor’s hands away if he hadn’t let go of Tony immediately anyway, “will not calm down in any way as long as you don’t tell me what the fuck is going on”, he brushed his hands over the engineer’s unusually pale and clammy skin, “ _say something, Thor_ ”

“I found him like this in the bedroom you used to-“

“What were you doing there?”, Loki’s voice cracked but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from his lover’s face.

“I went to check on him when he didn’t show up for the last team meetings”, Thor watched his brother pull Tony into his arms and against his chest, “and I thought it best to take him here”

Loki didn’t bother go on asking ‘why’; he could smell the alcohol on Tony and it didn’t exactly take a medic to tell that this wasn’t uncommon to find him in a state like this, “how long has he been doing this?”

“He hasn’t exactly been talking to anyone since…”, _since Loki had left, then_.

“I see”

“Loki, it’s not your-“

“Thank you for bringing him here, Thor”, Loki’s lashes cast long shadows down his jowls as he trained his eyes on Tony like he wanted to burn his image into his mind. He was probably doing just that, Thor thought as he made back for the door and closed it behind himself.

“What did you do to yourself?”, the god stroked the engineer’s hair back once his head had come to a rest against his own shoulder, Tony’s upper body settling against him although Loki angled him to the side so his weight would not press down on his belly as he slumped against his hold.

The tips of his fingers became feathers when he brushed them over the engineer’s skin ere he laid his hand against the side of his jaw, he could feel his breath shallow and warm and damp against his neck. He pressed his lips against the top of Tony’s head before he slid his hand down the side of his face and along his neck and laid it against the center of the engineer’s chest. His eyes slipped shut as he gently pressed his hand down harder while he let his magic run through his lover’s veins, purging every last amount of spirits and the damage they’d inflicted on Tony’s body from it.

“What were you even thinking”, he brushed his lips against his hair and the side of his lover’s face as he cradled him close, figuring that he could use the last couple of seconds before Tony’d come to again and savor the closeness he was probably experiencing for the last time. His own breathing was louder and heavier than usual in the afternoon silence as well, just on the verge of turning into sobbing while all the air left Tony’s lungs in a single loud gasp – he would have jolted up into a sitting position but the god held him close.

Tony’s blood turned into ice for a moment and he felt like his heart stopped beating before it settled back into a rhythm that was almost normal, just a little bit faster than it was supposed to be, beating and pushing the slush of ice and cleansed blood through his veins. His mouth kept hanging open when his breaths passed through his lips in harsh, ugly bouts, ripping at the air rather than breathing it in while his chest pushed up and down under Loki’s hands.  

“It’s alright”, he whispered, “Just breathe, Tony, you’re going to be fine. You don’t have to- I just”, Loki bit his bottom lip, still not letting go of the engineer, but also still not quite able to formulate a sensible sentence, “you’re safe, I’m so sorry I-“

“Loki”, Tony finally managed; his hands and arms still useless at his sides but he managed to turn his head and gaze up at him.

“Hey”, the god smiled down at him, smoothing his fingers over the engineer’s cheekbone. He really was bad at the whole letting-go-thing.

“Where are we?”, his lover blinked several times while the feeling returned to his limbs.

“Asgard”

“Like your home-planet”

“Like”, Loki agreed after a short pause.

“Never thought I’d get to see it”

“I’d probably have shown it to you sooner or later”

“No, you wouldn’t have”, Tony said in an easy tone of voice but the god didn’t bother with the usual banter that accompanied it.

“Tony, I’m sorry”

“I heard that” Tony Stark sounded resigned. The man that had saved Loki’s life and whom he’d fallen in love with was a lot of things but not _resigned_.

“I am. I didn’t mean to-“

“To do what, Loki?”, his head was heavy and still laying against the god’s shoulder.

It was ridiculous to have this discussion like that but Tony still felt slightly dizzy - amazingly not because of the spirits or their after-effects but because of the cold austerity Loki’s magic had left behind and how fast the cleanse had worked. He was pretty sure the god had not left a trace of alcohol in his body and, knowing Loki, had also undone the damage he’d done to himself in his lifetime - he wondered if that meant that his tolerance for liquor was done for as well.

“To hurt you”

“Come on”, Tony snorted, letting his head loll to the side, “you’re not the piece of ice you make other people think you are. You knew”

“I did”, the words were rough on Loki’s lips but he didn’t look away and he didn’t try to lie and break the promise he’d given him when they’d gotten together.

“You left anyway”, he was sounding like a sulky child but more than two months had passed since the god had taken off without as much as a word of explanation and the engineer thought that he had every right to feel a little pissed at that, now that he knew that Loki, apparently, was okay.

“I had to”

“I knew, you’d say that”, Tony’s eyes lost some of their warmth as he spoke; “I’d hoped you’d at least try to be a little more creative than that though.”

“I promised that I’d never lie to you”

“So”, the word lingered between them after engineer had shoved it through his teeth, like something you’d push out of the way to make room. For the other words that were waiting behind his teeth for example, but he wouldn’t do that, wouldn’t sink that low and say ‘What, the god of lies promised not to lie?’, “You’re gonna tell me?”, Tony asked instead.

“I’ll show you in a second”

“Why wait?”

“I need to look at you one last time”, _before you have that disgusted look in your eyes when you look at me._

“And I won’t get to have a say in that matter either, I take it?”

“Whether we’ll see each other again will be your decision entirely”

“… you got your look”, Tony said after a couple of minutes in a softer tone of voice, “come on”

“Do you think you can sit up on your own? Just for a moment?”

“’course”, Tone didn’t shake Loki’s hands off as he helped him into a sitting position, “what do you want me to do?”

“Just move back a little”

“Loki”, the engineer didn’t make a move, “I don’t-“

“You’ll get it”, the god said softly and cast his eyes downward before Tony even did what he’d said.

“I’ll get what exactly?”, Tony tried for a smile but his muscles apparently didn’t fully comply to his will yet and there was _this look_ on Loki’s face - he didn’t look afraid anymore but like he’d already accepted that he’d lost something he was never going to get back.

God, Tony hated it, when he was being even more of a drama queen than usual without even telling him why. He could deal with the drama as long as he knew what he was up against.

Loki didn’t say “ _this_ ” or add a dramatic gesture or flourish when he altered the glimmer he was constantly wearing these days and allowed Tony to see through.

“Are you- you’re not”, Tony half reached out for the god, “I mean you can’t”, he cradled his fingers through his own hair at the sight of the god’s body, “scratch that, of course you can”, he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the swell of Loki’s belly and his hands cupping it with long pale fingers and finally everything clicked into place; “you’re pregnant?”

“Sixth month”, Loki still didn’t look at him.

“France”

“Yes”

“And that’s why you’ve been kinda off before you-“

“Yes”, the second answer was even quieter.

“Loki, can I touch you please?”, Tony finally asked and the god nodded hesitantly, not moving an additional muscle, “I can’t believe this”, the engineer gently placed one hand on Loki’s upper arm and the other one on his leg, careful only to touch parts of the god’s body that had stayed the same since they’d last seen each other, “which is stupid but-“

“It really isn’t”, the god’s voice was flat as ever.

“You didn’t tell me because you thought I’d be-“, freaked out? Okay, he was, but more because of the whole, ‘we’re starting a family, I’ll be a father’-thing, “surprised?”, was the word he finally settled for, his eyebrows drawing together as he looked up at Loki.

“Well, it’s not exactly normal on your planet for-“

“You still think, I care about normal?”, Tony let go of his arm and laid his hand against the side of his face, his thumb coming to a rest next to his ear when he wasn’t pushed away, “Loki, c _ome on_ ”

“It’s really not that simple”, Loki laughed humorlessly.

“It really is for me. I mean, I didn’t exactly plan for us starting a fam-“

“Tony, this isn’t going to be a few weird months before everything goes back to normal”, Loki cut the engineer off, “even if you’re… alright with this _situation_ ”, _you becoming a father, us becoming a family_ , “chances are that the child’s not even going to be or look human”

“So? Loki just calm down for a second and think about a ‘normal day’ in our life”

“Fighting or working with something doesn’t mean you’ll be able to love it”

“As long as it’s half you, there’s no way I’m not going to adore him or her, no matter what”, Tony did his best, not to raise his voice or anything as he tried to make himself heard. The god had a habit of blanking out what he saw and heard when he was worked up like this.

“I know, I won’t be able hold you to that if-”, Loki said still, “but, Tony, I couldn’t take it if you…changed your mind after all. I’d rather keep the memory of you and me as we were than watch you reject us”, _me and our child._

Tony didn’t quite know what to say to that but he laid his other hand over Loki’s.

“What was it you were afraid of when you found out about the baby?”

“Tony-“

“Just answer me”, the engineer said in a soft voice, squeezing his fingers in his, “please”

“That you’d be weirded out but wouldn’t admit it to not hurt my feelings and stay with me although you’re unhappy and wanted to get away.”

_Wow_.

“And what did happen?”

“… you’re not?”

“No, I’m not and you know I’m not lying, Loki. Do you still not trust me?”, he hadn’t really meant the last thing and he felt sorry as soon as he saw the expression on the god’s face. He just had to try and make him understand before they ended up in a never-ending circle.

“Or course I trust you”, Loki’s eyes widened and his voice grew even softer, “you know I do”

“Normally I’d agree to that but you have to understand that you…taking off like that kind of conveys a different impression- I don’t wanna make you feel guilty or anything”, he added when Loki’s face went pale, “I just want to understand why you felt like you couldn’t just talk to me”

“You mean, I should have just said ‘I’m happy you’re back, by the way remember France? ‘Cause you kind of managed to knock me up while we were there’?”

“I have to admit that there’s a small chance that I-”

“-would have freaked out?”

“-would have been surprised, there’s a difference”, Tony corrected him softly, “I’d have gotten over it though, just like I’m getting over it now and am just happy about it, okay? That is…”

“…yes?”, Loki gazed down through his lashes.

“If you even want me to stay”

“I don’t want you to leave”, he shook his head.

“Okay”, Tony drawled out, tapping his fore- and middle-finger against the back of the god’s hand.

“But I don’t want you to stay because you think you have to”

“So what are you saying, Lokes?”, he cocked his head to the side and showed the god half a smile; “Look, I know you still don’t really believe me”, the engineer finally said, “and trust me, I’m not okay with that I’ll do everything I can to change it, but it still doesn’t mean you get to kick me out as long as you don’t really want me to leave. Tell me to go and I’ll do it but as long as you want to do this together, I’ll stay right here with you”

“Tony-“

“-and I promise I’m not going to leave you after-”

“Don’t promise”, Loki laid his hand against the side of his jaw and touched the pad of his thumb against his cheek, “I won’t make you do anything that goes against your will”

“Loki”, Tony laid his hand over his and turned his head to kiss the palm of his head, “we have reached the point of the conversation where you stop trying to tell me that I want to leave you and tell me how very happy you are to see me again”

“I _am_ very happy about that”, he finally returned the engineer’s smile, “I really am. I missed you so, so much, my love”

“I missed you too”


	7. A Note

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The next day.

“You’re not actually nervous about going for a walk”

“Next time, we’re gonna go running the gauntlet with people who’re despising _you_ , we’ll talk”, the god searched for Tony’s gaze in the reflection of the mirror he was gazing into, craning his neck to make sure the glimmer he was wearing was complete. He had not re-applied it since he’d altered and eventually removed it for Tony and now he wasn’t sure, whether he had, for a lack of better word, _covered_ everything. When he finally turned around to face his boyfriend, a sharp crease had appeared in between his brows; “Did I miss something?”

“I mean, you’ve been here for over two months now; what have you been doing ‘till now?”, Tony rolled off the bed and stepped up behind the god, got onto his tiptoes and rested his chin on his shoulder. He made a face at their reflection, when Loki automatically shifted and dropped his right shoulder as that was the only way, he was actually able to hook his chin over it, before he gave his answer “You look perfect, as always. Not a hair out of place”

Under normal conditions, Tony would have rolled his eyes and quietly scoffed about his drama queen of a spouse but seeing that he’d only gotten him back two days ago, he settled for pressing his nose against the side of his neck and adding “if anyone tries to fuck with you, I’ll make ‘em pay”

“I spent time with my mother or read or went for walks in the courtyards and gardens”, Loki ignored everything the Tony’d said after his question, turned his head and gently laid his forehead against the engineer’s, “I just avoided actually talking to anyone- I can still avoid people or move through them without being noticed if I want to”

“That I know”, Tony kissed the side of jaw and wrapped both arms around his waist, “I won’t make you socialize, you know. We’ll do whatever you want”

“I almost forgot how sweet you can be”, the god couldn’t help but smile as he gazed back at their reflection and laid one hand against the side of his face. His smile widened when Tony nuzzled into the touch and grinned back, both of them still facing the mirror, “and I love you even more for pretending you’re not dying to finally see everything. Come on”, he linked his fingers with Tony’s.

\---

If it weren’t against everything Tony thought he stood for, he’d be outright purring right now. He was reclining against the trunk of an ancient tree and a couple of thousand silk pillows and blankets and, by far the best thing, Loki was curled into his side, legs thrown across the engineer’s lap and head resting against his shoulder. The god’s fingers moved lazily through the warm air as he pointed at various different buildings and plants and explained their history or function, voice growing softer and softer as time went by and the sun set on the night-blue sky.

“I have to admit”, he kept brushing the tips of his own fingers over Loki’s – to everyone but the two of them, flat as ever – belly, his arm wrapped around his back and holding him close, “your home’s kinda awesome – from an outsider’s perspective of course”, he added at once when his boyfriend cupped his jaw, gently turned his head to face him and pointedly raised one eyebrow.

“Of course”, the god slowly blinked and brushed his thumb over Tony’s jaw before he buried his face in his neck again and yawned quietly.

He was always tired these days, had never really stopped being tired during the last weeks but compared to constantly being in pain and feeling sick, he felt pretty damn good, especially with his lover holding him like this and humming into his ear. It was beyond him how he’d been able to stand being away from him for two months, seeing how he didn’t seem to be able to stop touching and snuggling into him now.

They’d spent almost the entire day strolling through the same grounds, the trickster’s rooms were overlooking, their intertwined fingers as much a constant while Loki played tour-guide as the slightly bemused looks that followed them. Almost all of those were directed at the happy look on Loki’s face first and at the man at his side second though; most of them couldn’t remember the last time they’d seen him smile, never mind actually being happy.

“I thought, I’d show you the blacksmiths’ workshops tomorrow if you’d like me to”, the god went on after some time, “or the horses and stables… is there anything you’d like me to show you first?”

“Not as long as I get to see everything. I mean we’ll have at least a couple of months more, won’t we?”

“You’re going to stay here the entire time?”, Loki lifted his head up to look at him, eyes big and his lover bit the inside of his cheek.

“Is that against any law you got around here?”

“No, definitely not”, he blinked and went still for a couple of seconds before he continued, “I just assumed S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn’t that big on letting their people go on paternity-leave, that’s all”

“I want to make one thing clear, okay?”, Tony said with a quiet snort, “no one at S.H.I.E.L.D. – or anyone for that matter – could keep me from staying here with you and I definitely won’t leave the planet you two are on to go do Fury’s bidding. I’ll ask Thor to deliver him and the others a note from me that tells them that as well”

“A note?”

“I thought, I’d just tell them that we’ll stay here for a couple of months, on some secret mission or something, and take pictures of their faces when we …three get back”, he suggested but then added, “not that I’m saying-“

“…that’s exactly what I wanted to suggest to you”, Loki’s eyes went bright as he beamed at him.

The grin on the god’s lips made Tony’s mouth go dry and he only managed to keep from laughing for as long as it took him to stretch up to kiss his lips, “glad to hear we’re still on the same page here”


	8. Weak Charms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 5 weeks later

Tony brushed his lips against his lover’s closed lids, watching them flutter and his lashes cast dark shadows down his cheeks and against his porcelain skin. His eyes stayed closed as he continued to sleep in the engineer’s arm though, only his thin lips were barely parted and from time to time uttered soft words his partner couldn’t understand and unconsciously pushed himself firmer against Tony’s chest.

This was the most peaceful even Tony ever got to see trickster and he’d missed the sight while Loki had been gone. He still felt that pull in his chest every time he watched him sleep, which happened quite often now, with the god being a little over seven months along and pretty much constantly tired. Not that Tony found himself in a position to judge; the last two weeks Loki had spent on Midgard with him and how sick he’d felt all the time had been more than enough to show him that he himself definitely was in the more comfortable position in this relationship right now. Even now, here on Asgard, the toll the pregnancy was taking on Loki was showing; be it by him being sleepy and moodier than ever and experiencing weak headaches or nausea from time to time instead of him looking almost worse than he had looked whilst being unconscious and tied to a bed in one of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s secret hideouts directly after the whole Chitauri-escapade and utterly feeling like shit.

“I’m still not sure, whether it’s sweet or worrying of you to watch me until I wake up”

One vibrant green eye cracked open and Loki gazed at him without turning his head, half his face hidden away in his boyfriend’s chest.

“The combination’s what makes it special”, he kissed the wry grin off the god’s lips, “how do you feel?”

“Ungainly”, Loki made a face when he attempted shifting into a more comfortable position but found that rolling from his side onto his back took just slightly more energy than he was willing to bring up right now, “I doubt I’ll ever manage to get out of bed”, he eventually confessed and settled back down against his boyfriend, “you mind?”

“Not at all”

“Good”

Loki spent the next ten minutes trying to decide whether he should come to properly or continue dozing and eventually settled for the former.

“Good morning”, he blinked at Tony and laid his hand over his stomach, rubbing the pad of his thumb over the area where he felt the child’s movements the most distinctively.

He wasn’t quite sure, whether he’d awoken from her moving about more than usual or if she’d started kicking her feet more insistently once he’d come to.

“Morning”, Tony placed his hand next to his lover’s.

He felt himself grinning in the cheesiest fashion possible when he felt the baby kick and Loki mirrored his expression, albeit his smile grew more strained at a particular sharp kick and he made a soft ‘oof’

“You thought about a name yet?”, he eventually asked, his fingers still brushing over the smooth, dark blue silk of Loki’s sleepshirt.

“At first I wanted to wait with that until I’d gotten to know her better”, the god had attempted to explain to Tony how he knew they’d have a daughter without an ultrasonic or something but had, after more than an hour of explanation, settled for ‘I can feel it’ when more and more creases had appeared on his lover’s forehead. He could tell that Tony wasn’t able to just believe that completely, “and after you came here, I didn’t feel like that was only my decision to make anymore-”,

“-so you already have a favorite”

“It doesn’t really matter-“, Loki frowned and Tony touched the tips of his fingers to the lines on his forehead as if to smooth them down.

It was too early for him to start worrying about something.

“What’s going on in there, hm?”, he pressed his lips against his temple.

“It’s just that it’s tradition for the father to choose a name here. I don’t know if you’ve been told that already”

“Thor mentioned something… what about it?”, he grinned at the neutral expression the god tried to maintain, although the twitch of his mouth gave him away when he said; “nothing”

“Of course. And it’s not like you to get pissed about traditions like that either”

“Normally you’d be right about that”, Loki’s face smoothed again and he simply blinked at Tony again, “it’s just that…”

“Yes?”

“It doesn’t feel right to take this from you now”, he made a face at his choice of words right away and Tony quietly laughed at his expression.

“You know, a couple of years ago, I talked to some seriously shit-faced reporters”, he waved him off when Loki raised a brow at that, “and at some point one of them started telling me about her ex-fiancé and how he always wanted to have a huge family and shit and expected her to play stay-at-home-mom of course... Anyway; she said something that changed the way I saw these things… wanna know what?”

“The previous ten minutes would be quite a waste if I didn’t say ‘yes’ wouldn’t they?”

“…so”, he squinted but went on and Loki snickered softly, “she said that if she’d ever felt the need to experience … ‘months and months of feeling like crap and morning sickness and ruining her shape to push an actual living human being out of her, she’d be the one who’ll decide on its name’”, Tony had closed his eyes for a second or two to get the statement right, ”yeah that was pretty much it”, he barely nodded to himself and blinked his eyes open again before he continued, “and I have to admit, that kind of stayed with me so…”, he blew a dark strand that had settled over his own face like a slim black moustache aside; Loki’s hair somehow always ended up all over the place, especially directly after he’d woken up.

Actually; only after they’d been dating for more than three months had Loki allowed him to actually see what he looked like, directly after waking up. Only then he’d removed the weak charm he usually wore on his hair and body to always be presentable and Tony still thought that it was a damn shame that he’d never get those months of bleary-eyed Loki with his hair looking like a bird’s nest and pillow creases on his cheek and body back, especially after discovering what a gorgeous sight it actually was. Even more so since he knew it for the mark of confidence it was on Loki’s part; “you go ahead and stay with the name you picked, I think that’s only fair”

 “You don’t want to have any say at all in this?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to say, isn’t it?”

“None at all? Tony, I don’t insist on-”

“You want me to give it to you in writing?”

“I want you to tell me whether you’re sure about it and won’t regret it”

“I really don’t like how often we’ve been saying that during the last months”

“Considering how stubborn you can be”

“Me?”

“…maybe me as well”, Loki allowed after a couple of seconds and nudged the tip of his nose against his boyfriend’s jawline, “maybe”

“We’ll have just the best time raising _her_ then, huh?”, Tony moved the tip of his index-finger in a circle below the god’s navel and Loki’s face screwed up with him trying not to squirm.

“I’m counting on it”, he still said after a couple of minutes after the movement of Tony’s fingers had stilled and his voice had lost all touch of mockery when he attempted to press his lips to the corner of his mouth but Tony angled his head as he often did when Loki tried this and the trickster ended up kissing him properly. Not that any of them actually minded, “just to be clear, do you want me to tell you now or wait?”

“Never really been one for surprises”

“Rosaline”, Loki showed him a tiny, uncertain smile whilst waiting for a reaction, “I thought it’d be nice for you to actually be able to pronounce it”

“Come on, I’m pretty sure you guys here are born with additional organs just so you can speak … _Old Norse_ ”, Tony shot back immediately but went still after that for a minute; “Rosaline…”, he repeated slowly, a thoughtful expression settling over his face, “Really?”

“You hate it”, the god’s face fell involuntarily and he bit his teeth sunk into his bottom lip.

“No”, Tony insisted before his boyfriend had even finished his sentence, “No, I mean I do like it, it’s beautiful, really”

He waited for another couple of seconds until Loki gazed at him again, a softer look on his face, “it’s just not what I expected”

“Felt right”, the god shrugged.

Of course.

“And it’s got nothing to do with your fixation on Shakespeare of course”, Tony wiped his grin off his lips when Loki elbowed him, but his eyes told a different story, “no, it’s really gorgeous. I promise you, I like it”

“You’re sure?”

“Completely”

“If you want her to have a second name, you’ll be the one to pick that one”, Loki eventually declared before he pushed himself into a sitting position halfway and placed his hand over Tony’s mouth just in case, “and that’s fair”

“Fine”, the engineer gently pried is lover’s fingers away from his face and held them between his own, “I’d like Maria”, he said softly and pressed his lips against Loki’s knuckles, seeing that he, quite coincidentally, found his hand between his own. He didn’t let go of it when Loki halfheartedly tied to pull it back to lay it against the spouse’s face.

“Alright then”, Loki’s eyes had slipped shut when Tony’s lips had first made contact with his skin and his lids fluttered open now that it was obvious that his boyfriend didn’t want to go into the business with his parents right now, “it does have a nice ring to it”

He reached up with his other hand and finally did lay it against Tony’s jaw, brushing his thumb over the faint stubble before he tugged him closer and followed the path, his fingers had just taken up with his lips, finally resting his jowl against Tony’s, “you’re a good man, Anthony Stark, people just don’t give you the credit you deserve.”

“Screw people”, the skin around Tony’s eyes crinkled when he smiled at his boyfriend, “I got you, Rose here, our cheery band of rightful idiots back in Manhattan and Pepper, the rest of the world can think whatever the hell they want.”

“That’s exactly right”, Loki said as if he believed the last part. In his opinion, Midgard should be happy about what Tony was willing to do for them; about him even going as far as regularly putting his own life in danger to save and protect them and especially about the fact that he would never stop putting that over everything else, beside Loki’s welfare, “don’t ever forget that, love”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Within the MCU-fandom, Tony Stark does often get the short end of the stick and I really think, that finally has to change, so the end of this chapter became a little fluffier than intended.
> 
> I really hoped, you enjoyed it and thank you for the comments some of you let on the previous chapters, it really means a lot to me to know someone acutally likes reading this,
> 
> Lots of love <3


	9. Life-span

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three months later

The question had been on the tip of Tony’s tongue for weeks. For seven weeks to be more precise. About seven weeks ago, Loki had passed being eight months along and from what little Tony had thought to have known about pregnancies without having to ask Frigga or Loki, he’d thought eight months was about the time about-to-be-parents got nervous.

Apparently he was the only one who did though and now, almost two months later, he barely dared to leave the room Loki was in, touch him or even openly disagree with him when they talked about something. Since Loki was Loki that meant that the majority of their conversations currently consisted in Tony changing the topic and the god rolling his eyes.

\---

“What is it?”, Loki didn’t even look up from his book.

“Nothing”, he immediately answered as the god’s voice had the same touch of annoyance to it, it had had more often than not during the last weeks.

Tony had learned not to press anything and just shut up when Loki sounded like that after he’d gotten his head chewed off by the god a couple of times. Especially since said god always felt bad about snapping at him after a couple of hours anyway -and it wasn’t like it was so hard to guess why Loki was in a foul mood - or rather skipping from one foul mood into the other - either with his aching back, headaches, swollen feet and ankles or the fact that he’d stopped being able to move as he pleased weeks ago.

“Stop starring then”

“I’m sorry”, Tony stated in his most soothing tone of voice, the one that made Loki want to tell him off when he was in a good mood.

“For fuck’s sake”, he heard Loki snap the tome shut more than he saw it and only looked up again when he thought he could actually feel his glare burn holes into his skin, “what do you want?”

“I was just thinking about something”

“And what would that be?”, the sneer Loki wore would have haunted his lover’s sleep for days to come if he hadn’t gotten accustomed to it during the last weeks; his eyes narrowed to two slits as he continued glaring at Tony from where he was curled up on an old wooden bench with his back resting against the wall.

Tony himself was sitting cross-legged on the floor of the balcony they were on and still working on the list of things they’d have to get or change around their home once they’d returned to the tower in Manhattan. At this point said list consisted in ten pages and he was currently working on the beginning of the eleventh. Every time he set the pencil down, something else came to him and he hadn’t even begun asking Loki for his ideas yet. _Maybe_ , he caught himself thinking from time to time, _maybe it would be easier to just throw out everything they owned and furnish their place anew or add another story to the tower which they’d design to fit the needs of a new family and infant_.

“I don’t want this to come out the wrong way or anything-“

“Just talk then”

So it was one of _those_ afternoons.

“Aren’t you… kind of nervous?”

That gave the god pause and he placed the book down beside him on the cushion, “about what exactly?”

“…about you going in labor?”, Tony arched an eyebrow, “because, correct me if I’m wrong, but it’s been ten months now and I have this thing about nine months in the back of my mind”

“That’s a good thing, Tony”, his expression grew softer then and he motioned for Tony to get up and sit down beside him, “the longer this”, he stroked a hand over his swollen belly, “lasts, the better the chances that her lifespan will surpass the average human life span”

_Obviously. Why hadn’t he thought of that?_

“Surpass as in being immortal?”, he still weakly asked, just to be sure.

“Not quite. She will grow up a lot slower than a human child and once she’s reached adulthood, she may eat the apples of Idún, as we do. They’ll slow her aging down drastically so she can live for centuries without growing old”

“No offense”, Tony swallowed and swallowed again until he felt vaguely assured that there would be a voice coming out of his mouth once he’d open his lips, “but this seems like the sort of thing I should know about- is there any particular reason why you haven’t mentioned anything till now?”

“I didn’t know for sure whether this would happen. Tell you the truth, I’m still not completely sure it’s the case right now or just something else weird that comes with crossbreeding two species that normally would never mingle. I didn’t want to tell you without knowing something for sure and get my- our hopes up”

“You didn’t wanna jinx it”, Tony said with a short, slightly bewildered laugh.

“That’s about it, yes”, the god cast his eyes downwards for a moment. A faint blush rose up the base of his cheeks when he looked his lover in the eye again, “I also wanted to wait until I was in a better mood myself because I wanted to ask you something and I wanted it to be a nice conversation”

“Okay”, Tony smiled and squeezed one of his hands in his. Finally one mood swing that made things easier.

“Or offer you to be more precise”

“Come on now”, his smile widened when the god continued fidgeting.

“In principle”, he finally started and squeezed the engineer’s fingers back, “it’s possible for humans to … elongate their lifespan by consuming the apples of Idùn as well. I don’t know how powerful their effects will be when they’re consumed by a human being for sure though. It’s possible that you’d have to eat one once a century or once a week for their effect to kick in properly. No matter what, you would be able lengthen your lifespan, probably indefinitely”, he held up a finger when he noticed Tony opening his lips, “and while I won’t pressure you to-“

“Hold on a sec; you say I could become ‘almost immortal’?”

“Quite possibly yes, but you don’t have to decide anything right now and-”

“Would you want me to?”, he cut the god off once more, “would you want me to do that and stay with me…basically forever?”

“Tony, that’s your decision. I couldn’t-“

“I want to know that before I decide for or against anything”

“Obviously I want you to; I wouldn’t offer this to you if I didn’t”, Loki shot him one of those looks that just plainly said ‘how stupid can you possibly be’ before he blinked again and cleared his throat, “and I wouldn’t want our child to lose her father to old age or some kind of illness”

“Which is very considerate of you, of course”, Tony’s smile widened before the god kissed it away.

“I wouldn’t mind not having to worry about that last one too much either”, he whispered against Tony’s lips, “I took to enjoying your company, you know, and I don’t really like the idea of something taking you away from us in the near future if you don’t mind”

Amazingly, the last part didn’t come out testily or as a sneer but almost as a genuine question. Like Tony would mind Loki wanting to be with him for decades to come.

“No, I don’t mind”, Tony touched the side of Loki’s face as he looked at him, “go back to your book, I think I only have about two hundred things left to write down and I’ll shut up and not bother you anymore while I’m at it, okay?”

“I could read it to you if you wanted me to”, the god offered.

He placed his free hand on his lover’s thigh, not holding him in place but offering him to stay as close as he wanted. Tony usually enjoyed the god reading to him, especially if one of them was feeling antsy.

“Depends on what it is you’re reading”

“Wilde”

That special smile, reserved only for a handful of authors and composers.

“I could have guessed”, Tony pulled his legs up onto the bench they were sitting on, leant back and slung an arm around Loki, allowing him to curl into him and lean his head against his shoulder, “comfortable?”

“Comfortable enough”, Loki opened the book again after a couple of minutes of shifting around and cleared his throat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, this week's chapter is kind of short, but adding it to last week's didn't feel right either, I still hope, you've enjoyed it and stay tuned for next week's.


	10. Rituals

During the almost forty years of Tony Stark’s life he had been in more critical/dangerous and possibly life-threatening situations than he could count, never mind cared to remember. There had only been a couple of times he’d actually been scared out of his mind though and this moment would definitely be ranked among them.

“Your rituals are so extremely stupid, I can’t even come up with a word for it”, he berated Thor, who had sat down on the floor opposite the door to his brother’s chambers, back against the wall and a wicked looking knife in one, a whetstone in his other hand.

The sun had set hours ago and there were only a handful of different sounds disturbing the cool, still air of the night; the low scrape of the whetstone gliding across the long blade and Tony’s footsteps echoing in the empty corridor were the most persistent ones while Loki’s cries and curses sounded through the thick doors from time to time and joined in. Tony wasn’t quite sure, whether Loki was actually screaming loud enough to overpower the spells he himself had cast onto the doors and walls of his chambers to soundproof those decades ago or whether he had weakened or done away with said spells to make a point to his lover and brother. The engineer would not put either option past his boyfriend.

“Didn’t come up with them, Stark”, Thor didn’t even look up from his hands when Tony momentarily ceased pacing and stopped in front of him, both hands still tangled in his hair halfway and pulling at the strands.

“Who would have thought”, he deadpanned but didn’t explicitly say anything about the way Thor’s face was still noticeably paler than usual.

A couple of hours ago the three of them had sat together at the edge of a small oval lake whose name Tony didn’t bother even try pronounce correctly; Loki had been feeling nauseous all day and decided that some fresh air would probably be the best remedy for that. Tony had obviously tagged along and continued working on the sketches for the nursery back at the tower – he had come up with several different designs since Loki had started showing him around on Asgard, most of them inspired by Asgardian architecture. His brother had joined them at some point as he would leave for Midgard soon and wanted to spend a little more time with the couple before he’d have to go.

They’d been talking quietly - well, Thor and Tony had been while the trickster had pretty much just been dozing in the warm afternoon-sunlight, head in his lover’s lap, legs stretched out over Thor’s. He had even tolerated his brother resting his hands on his legs from time to time and had allowed him, not for the first time, to directly touch his stomach and feel the baby’s kicks and movements - not that either of the brothers or Tony commented on that.

At some point, Loki had, somewhat jerkily, pushed himself into a sitting position though and but had waved off their questions whether he was okay. Yet, he had spent the majority of the next hour, shifting and wriggling around uncomfortably and had eventually declared that he might be in labor and someone should probably go and call for Frigga and the horde of priestesses and healers, she’d instructed to look after him and the child.

Thor had almost tripped over his own feet on his way to get them – and maybe get away from the couple before the actual delivery started; battlefields and slaughter he could stomach, childbirth? Not so much. Loki, Frigga and most of the rest of the women on Asgard had still not let him live down that time when he’d, kind of drunkenly, accidently walked in on a woman give birth on Alfheim when he and the three warriors had went there for a trip and had ended up almost fainting. Fandral had been the only one who’d finally shown pity and helped him stalk off while Sif had almost ended up ending crying with laugher.

Meanwhile Tony had helped Loki to his feet and slowly walked him back to their rooms, one arm wrapped around him, his other hand slid between Loki’s who’d already been clutching onto his fingers before they’d even left the gardens.

That had been hours ago and he’d stayed at the trickster’s side as long as he had been allowed to, holding his hands while Loki had convulsed in pain and screamed and cursed him in every tongue Tony knew and a couple of languages he didn’t understand, before he’d been kicked out of the room by the healers. Because apparently, on Asgard, fathers were not allowed to stay with their partner while they gave birth. Neither of the brothers should ever go ahead and call the traditions or health-care-practices of Tony’s home planet old-fashioned again.

“Aren’t you done with that by now?”, he now snapped at Thor.

The raw sound of the whetstone scraping over the knife’s edge over and over had been drawing on his nerves for over two hours now as did the fact, that Loki who usually bit his teeth and snarled at any bystanders when he was in pain, had actually been screaming out loud for the last hours. He was cut off by the blonde healer, whom he’d not once heard utter a word, pushing the doors open and actually telling him to come in if he wanted to, though.

“No, I’d much rather stay out here and wait for another three hours”, he was already half past her when he finished his answer and didn’t catch her rolling her eyes and exchanging a look with Thor who was shaking his head and mouthing an apology.

“Hey”, he then said in a much softer tone of voice when he reached the foot of the bed.

The god laid there with half closed eyes, chest still rising and falling rather unevenly and legs lying in an awkward, crooked V on the sheets – different ones than earlier, Tony noted absently, but that made sense, he guessed.

“Hey”, Loki echoed equally quietly, voice hoarse, and forced dark red eyes open to gaze at his boyfriend.  

He was no longer wearing the embroiled maroon tunica and gray leggings from earlier either but was dressed in loose black shorts and a dark green dressing gown which slipped further off his right shoulder every time he moved the tiniest bit, exposing skin that wasn’t as much pale as it had a blue tinge to it but that was fading as they spoke. There was a slightly lost look in his eyes as he reached out for Tony, clenching his teeth as he stretched out his arm; “could you come here, please?”

Tony didn’t ask whether he was sure - being with an almost all-powerful god for more than two years kind of knocked that out of you - and very gingerly sat down to his left, looping his arm around his waist when Loki leaned into him, holding his breath when he moved.

“Is this okay?”

“Thank you”, Loki sighed, his voice thick and on the verge of wavering while his lids slipped shut for a handful of seconds and he breathed in deeply, some of the tension seeping out of his muscles, his head lolling to the side and coming to a rest against Tony’s chest, “thank you, Anthony”

If he’d ever do this again, he would find a way for Tony to stay with him during the delivery, not like this time and this time had been _bad._

He’d definitely been glad that he’d returned to his home-planet and had had several healers with him who’d helped once the pauses between the contractions had started shortening and the actual delivery had come closer and finally had been upon him. If it hadn’t been for them, he’d definitely be in worse shape now and he still, half an hour after they’d first laid the tiny, wailing girl on his chest, felt far from even remotely well. Although this had less to do with him actually _hurting_ , than him feeling, for a lack of better description, not whole. He’d, obviously, gotten so used to the extra weight, even moving without if felt weird now but what was really missing was his daughter’s presence itself, as well as the feeling of her movements and kicks.

It wasn’t just that though; despite the healers, the priestesses and even Frigga who’d stayed with him and had taken Tony’s place at his side and held his hands, stroked his hair back and kept talking to and trying to distract him, he’d felt so utterly alone during the labor which had seemed to go on forever, steadily growing worse, and the delivery itself which had been over faster but excruciating.

“I take it, you don’t want to ‘grind my skull to dust and scatter it across all nine worlds’ anymore then?”, Tony showed him a dry smile before he pressed his lips against the side of the god’s neck. If he noticed the way Loki kept pushing closer to him still, he didn’t mention it but held on tighter as well.

“Maybe later”, Loki smiled back sluggishly. His spouse’s presence definitely helped.

“Whatever you say”, Tony smoothed his fingers up and down his arm, not daring to touch him anywhere near his stomach or lower body just yet, “you’re kinda cold- you want a blanket or something?”

“No, thank you”, he still felt like he was burning up but that would pass soon enough hopefully.

His skin steadily lost its bluish touch already and only his eyes remained a dark red instead of their usual green, “I’m not hiding her in a drawer or something by the way so you can stop squinting when you think I’m not looking”, he managed to turn one corner of his mouth upwards for Tony to see, “we’ll have her right back as soon as they made sure she’s fine”

“That obvious, huh?”                                                                                       

“Kind of”, Loki swallowed a moan when he shifted to face his boyfriend, “but I can get behind that, made a point of telling them to hurry too”, he’d only gotten to hold her for a couple of minutes earlier.

“You mean, you threatened them”, under normal circumstances, Tony would have shoved him but settled for arching an eyebrow.

“Maybe”, the god trailed of when one of the priestesses – there were so many, Tony had eventually given up trying to remember all their names and this one, he’d only seen once before – knocked at the open door and entered the room.

“Thank you”, Loki added in English after they’d exchanged a couple of words in the guttural language Tony had only heard spoken a couple of times among the healers and priestesses since he’d arrived on Asgard, and she had carefully placed the baby in his waiting arms.

“Thank you”, he too called after the priestess absentmindedly just before she’ left the room but he couldn’t tear his eyes off the tiny girl that still whimpered quietly when she snuggled into Loki’s arms and chest but quietened down pretty quickly after he’d bent down to kiss her face and hands and whispered so silently to her, even Tony couldn’t make out a word.

“How narcissistic would I sound if I said that we did a pretty good job?”, he whispered, angling his head to have a better look at her as soon as she’d settled down.

She looked just like Loki, or rather, how Loki looked when he slept and didn’t have nightmares for once and his face was all open and relaxed. Although…, Tony cocked his head again and couldn’t help but grin, she _did_ have his nose and her lips were fuller than Loki’s as well. The soft wisps of hair on top of her head were just as pitch black as the god’s though and her skin had, while still looking slightly flushed, the faintest touch of blue-ish white to it as well.

“You’d be right about that anyway”, Loki whispered back.

Tony had never seen him look so utterly entranced, face soft and lips parted just the tiniest bit as he gazed down at her. His skin almost had its normal color back, although the dark circles beneath his red eyes didn’t go without notice.

“Apart from one thing”, the engineer kissed the side of his face again, slowly reaching out to touch the tiny hand that was clutching onto the hem of the white blanket Rose was wrapped in, and whispered, “hey, sweetheart”

“And what would that be?”, even his voice was softer than Tony had ever heard it, almost beyond recognition.

“ _You_ did amazing”, he brushed his fingers over hers and smiled from ear to ear when her hand tightened its grip on the blanket before he smoothed the very tips of his fingers even more carefully along her cheek.

Her skin felt warmer than Loki’s and she made another snuffly sound, eyes squinting open for a second. They were of the same color as her mother’s as well and Tony wondered if her eyes would change color too… even though that shade did suit her.

“I’m not going to disagree with you here, you know”, Loki lifted the hand he’d placed over his daughter’s belly and chest up to lay it against Tony’s face, “and thank you”, he couldn’t quite fight of the yawn that had waited to push past his lips for the past five minutes.

“You want me to turn off the lights and sleep for a bit?”, his boyfriend asked, already making moves to reach for the candles on the nightstand.

“Not yet”, the god shook his head, lowering his hand again to gently touch her chin, “we’ve waited so long and she’s too gorgeous to stop looking at her already”, he brushed his lips against the top of her head again when she mewled quietly; “you are, sweetness”

“Alright, but please don’t push yourself too far just yet”

Tony couldn’t decide whom he wanted to kiss first so he settled for touching his lips against her forehead, careful not to scratch her with his beard, then against Loki’s temple and pulled back the tiniest bit when the god went still, “what is it?”

“It’s not that I sometimes forget that I love you”, Loki whispered, gaze locked with Tony’s, “there are just moments when I realize how much I actually do”

“I love you too”, the engineer smiled back because he was holding his family close and he was damn well allowed to be cheesy as hell whilst doing so, “both of you”

Loki was right; eleven months had been far too long.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hope, you've enjoyed this, thank you for reading and the comments you left; it's great to know that someone actually enjoys reading this <3


	11. Charm

 

Tony was curled into the heavily ornamented chair he’d pushed up next to Loki’s bed and talked to him in a soft voice when Odin knocked against the door and entered the trickster’s chambers.

“May I see my grandchild then?”, he asked as he strode over from the door to the front of the bed, his hands folded behind his back. 

“I don’t know about one you could look at”

Loki was reclining against several silk pillows with the tiny girl sleeping on his chest. Her head was resting over his heart which seemed to be her favorite spot and she only ever quietened down properly when he held her like this, although Tony cradling her close worked as well. Tony suspected that she liked to sleep there because she could hear/feel her mother’s heartbeat there and it made her feel safe. Up until now, she had only slept with either Tony or Loki holding her anyway.

Even as he looked up at the Allfather with a cold glare, Loki kept carefully rubbing the tips of his fingers in little circles over Rose’s back but when he gazed back down at her, the lines on his face smoothed and he brushed the very tips of his fingers along her soft cheek before the slid into the soft raven black wisps of hair that covered the top of her head.

“Loki, do you me to-”, Tony started but his boyfriend interrupted him quietly.

“Tony, would you please take Rose”, he kept his voice level as he openly looked Odin in the eye.

“Are you sure?”,

Tony swallowed before he spoke and didn’t get up yet, but he would not step between those two.

“I most certainly am”, Loki was still not taking his eyes off the allfather as he slowly pulled his hand away from his daughter and Tony got up and carefully picked her up.

He kept looking back as carried Rose out of the room although his attention was mainly focused on her and doing his best not to hold her too tightly or, heaven forbid, drop her. Yesterday night he’d first gotten to hold her, half an hour or so after he’d been allowed back into the room, doing exactly what Loki had told him to and being extremely glad that the god had experience with this and pointed out what he had to concentrate on and was not supposed to do.

After Loki had been satisfied with the way his spouse had been cradling her close, he’d finally agreed to try and sleep. He had dozed off within the next hour, snuggling into Tony’s side, who had spent half the night alternating between softly touching and kissing both his boyfriend and daughter and had quietly humming some half-remembered melody to her until she’d woken up because she was hungry from time to time.

“What do you want, Allfather?”

The trickster winced quietly as he shifted and pushed himself up, holding his breath until he slumped against the silk pillows. It was too early for him to have this discussion with Odin and he still felt drained and far too weak. What he wanted to do was hold his daughter, maybe whilst being held by his love in turn and talk to her and Tony, maybe sleep a little more with both of them at his side. Frigga had looked in on them twice to make sure her granddaughter was okay and to look after her own son.

There was a limit to what she could do for him with the magic he’d worked on his body himself and the spells and blessings she, the healers and priestesses had been placing on and casting over him over the last months and especially the last hours. Still, she still brought him herbs and placed soothing spells on him and did basically everything she could and if their effect was not great enough to take all the pain away, her presence and taking care of him did the best job at helping him recover.

Thor too had visited them in the morning and while he’d kept his stay brief, it had been plain as daylight to Tony how happy it had made both of the brothers as had been the fact, that tiny Rosaline Mary Stark had, within the first hours of her life, already successfully wrapped Asgard’s queen, the god of thunder and both her parents around her little finger, without even being awake half the time.

“I told you, I just wanted to have a look at your daughter”

“And why should I allow that?”

Loki clenched his teeth behind closed lips but did push himself up further, into an almost upright position. He would not give this to the Allfather.

“Why does everything always have to be so complicated with you?”, Odin heaved a mournful kind of sigh but stayed where he was.

“Are you serious”, Loki’s voice was strangely flat as he looked at the allfather like he’d never seen him before, “are you actually serious?”

“I did not mean to”, the corner of Odin’s mouth twitched slightly, “ _hurt your feelings_ , I merely-“

“You merely thought of the greater good”, the trickster spit out, his eyes bright and narrowed, “I understood you perfectly, don’t worry. But I don’t have to accept that; you can’t expect me to just smile and tell you everything is fine.”

“I have not asked any such thing from you”

“Of course”, Loki snorted, shaking his head, “of course you haven’t. I am not foolish enough to believe you would even think of asking forgiveness from me”

“For saving your life and raising you as my son?”

“’As your son’, yeah alright”

“Loki-“

“If you don’t mind, I am exhausted”, Loki crossed his arms in front of him, “and I don’t see a point in listening to this; I’ve endured enough pain over the last hours” 

“You are overreacting”

“Because I felt hurt when I discovered the truth or because I still do?”, the trickster’s dug his fingernails into his forearms, his teeth clenched so hard, it hurt.

“Would you rather I kept lying to you?”

“I’d rather you had never started lying to me in the first place”, Loki’s voice all of a sudden was no more than a whisper as he turned his face away.

He didn’t miss Odin’s quiet ‘as do I’, but ignored it. He wasn’t ready for this.

“Please, _please_ leave me alone, I can’t do this right now. We won’t overstay your welcome for much longer either I promise you that.”

“As you wish”, the allfather eventually nodded his head and turned towards the door, “just one thing and I ask you to listen very carefully”, Loki didn’t answer but then again, Odin had not expected him to, “you are not overstaying your welcome; you will always be welcome here, you and your family. That I can promise you, that you have to remember. Frigga and Thor”, he paused as if to say something else but shook his head the tiniest bit before he went on, his voice sounding just the tiniest bit changed, “both love you so much; they could not bear losing you again”

“They won’t”, the younger god whispered and finally turned towards Odin, his expression softening, “I swear they won’t”

“I am glad to hear that” with that, the allfather left the room and Loki could not bring himself to stop watching him retreat.

When Tony returned with Rosie a short while later, he found his lover still facing towards the door, a strangely intense thoughtful expression on his face.

“You okay?”, he asked when he slowly walked up towards the bed.

“I am”, Loki sounded honestly surprised at his own answer, a hesitant smile making its way onto his lips, “I think we both are, actually”, he motioned for Tony to sit down next to him on the bed instead of the armchair.

This had been the most pleasant interaction he’d had with the allfather in years, even before Thor had been banished.

“That’s surprising”, Tony pressed his lips against the side of the god’s face.

He had met Odin shortly after Thor had brought him to Asgard but he had not directly spoken to him for longer than five minutes then and he really didn't feel sore about that; the Allfather was one of the most intense guys Tony he had ever met and with everything Loki had told him and Thor had let slip, Tony wasn’t too keen on ‘cultivating a friendship’, as Odin had called it but almost definitely not meant it. He offered Loki to take Rose back and hold her but the god smiled properly and shook his head; “you’re doing pretty well so far”

“What can I say? I learned from the best”, Tony beamed at him and Loki looked like he was in actual physical pain again.

The smile the engineer showed his lover was just as bright as always but his skin was smoother, his eyes brighter and there were no wrinkles on his forehead or around his eyes and mouth, even his hair seemed a darker shade of brown and thicker. His whole body was more toned and he felt stronger since he’d eaten the golden apple, coincidentally on the day before Rose had been born.

He wondered whether Loki and Thor always felt like this and how long _he_ would experience this exact feeling and whether he’d get used to it. During the last two days, the thought, what the rest of his team would think of the change had crossed his mind a couple of times, but up until now he’d decided to push it away for the time being.

The fact that his arc-reactor was now sitting in a box on their nightstand instead of his chest on the other hand would definitely not go unnoticed but he pushed that aside as well; it was, after all, more the result of Frigga having regularly reminded him that she could get rid of it for him (and Loki quietly voicing his worries about it and the question whether it would keep up with the changes the golden apple inflicted on Tony’s body as well) than anything and Tony had finally accepted it a couple of weeks ago. Right now, the most important thing was that the blue light had been turned off and was not directly next to their daughter’s face and that he was with his own little family.

“You are terrible”, Loki sighed, touching the side of Tony’s face, “and I think the fact that that’s starting to grow on me’s the worst thing about it”, he added when the engineer nuzzled into his touch.

“That’s called ‘charm’, honey, and I told you, you’d end up under mine sooner rather than later”, he grinned at Loki who squinted back before he did carefully lift the baby out of Tony’s hold when she started grouching and wriggling there and laid her down on his chest again.

“That you did”, the god made himself comfortable and allowed himself a small smile once their daughter had quietened down again. He actually felt his heart speed up beneath where Rose’s head was resting when he looked at Tony, “that you did, my love”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You may or may not have noticed, that I changed the number of chapters from 11 to 12... I hope you don't mind one (or more) additional chapters...
> 
> Anyway, as always, thank you for reading, I hope, you've enjoyed this!


	12. Bling

People weren’t shocked when they learned that Tony Stark could dance. He had been attending charity-parties for, what felt like, his whole life and he’d been put through all sorts of etiquette-training growing up. Once he’d taken over Stark-industries and had had to show up at and even host charity-events and sometimes even balls himself as well, he’d had danced on those if he hadn’t been able to talk himself out of it.

He would probably not win competitions or anything with his abilities but he was also more than capable of not making an utter fool of himself with them. No, people were not shocked when they learned that he could dance, they just tended to forget about it.

Loki on the other hand… well, he never actually let himself be seen in public, dancing or breathing or doing anything in the first place. That had been one of the main issues, his relationship with Tony had faced at first; the question whether they’d make it official and have some sort of ‘coming out’, as stupid as that sounded to both of them, via a press-conference or something or not.

_“I don’t really care”, he’d told the engineer with a shrug one evening a couple of weeks after they’d gotten together. They’d been having a bath together and Tony had introduced him to the ingenious thing that bath bombs were - he’d also discovered that the sight of Loki with his hair in a loose knot was one to behold; “I’m in love with you and you…”, he’d found himself come to a stop and scooped some foam up in one hand. He spread it along Tony’s shoulder, careful not to mess with the arc reactor and get it wet, although he’d been told not to worry about that, to give himself a second or two to try and gather up the courage he’d need to continue._

_“…feel exactly the same way…”, Tony had intoned with a fond smile which his boyfriend hadn’t been able to see with Tony’s chin resting against the crown of his head and his hand lying low on the god’s stomach._

_“Yes, that”, the last word had hitched in the back of the god’s throat and the bases of his jowls had reddened the tiniest bit even before Tony had moved his hand and slung his arm around his middle instead._

_“It’s not like I have to prove something to anyone or need you to tell the whole world about us to believe you”_

_“I still don’t want you thinking, I’m ashamed or anything stupid and not telling people about us because of that”_

_“No, I don’t think like that at all”, Loki had covered his boyfriend’s hand with his own, smoothing more foam along his skin, “really; we’ve already had that discussion before the others officially knew about us”,_ and I would know if you lied to me but we both know that already.

_“To tell you the truth, if us telling the media about our relationship involves me and a lot of publicity, I’d rather not do it straight away”_

_“Okay”, Tony had squeezed his fingers back and kissed his shoulder, “then we won’t do it until you feel comfortable with it or not at all if you don’t want to”_

The only downside this had brought with it had been that they had not really been able to have normal dates or trips or anything. At least, that had been what Tony had thought and it had been the main reason, he’d brought the topic of going public up in the first place. He had not wanted to make Loki feel like they had to hide - like Loki had to hide from anything - when he had actually been recovering from the torture the Chitauri had put him through and seemed to be in a good place for the time being. So, acting against every instinct that run through generations and generations of the Stark-family, he had openly told him about his feelings and had asked what Loki had wanted and thought they should do.

The solution his lover had suggested to him a couple of days later had been so simple, that it had taken him several minutes to answer Loki when he’d asked him what he thought of it. Instead of suggesting to hide at one of Tony’s places or remote locations or dressing up and sneaking around, Loki had shown him a slim black ribbon which was studded with a single round, dark purple gem. It was roughly the size of a dime, a perfect circle with a smooth surface and so dark it looked almost black but for a pale sort of mist that seemed to spread along its edges when it caught the light at a certain angle.

_“Don’t laugh at me”, Loki had told him quietly as he’d sat down on the edge of the bed beside Tony, had hoisted his leg up onto the mattress and had fastened the ribbon around his left ankle before he’d_ _touched the tips of his fingers to the stone for an instinct during which its entire surface seemed to turn a milky white._

_“I’ll think about it if you tell me what it’s supposed to do”, Tony had said with a dubious look and flattened the sheets his lover had pushed aside down to have a better look at him._

_“It averts all attention or recognition aimed towards the person wearing it. Makes them inconspicuous, if you want, to almost everyone”_

_“So people will be able to see you and just not pay attention”_

_“Exactly”, one of the reasons, Loki was so fond of his boyfriend was that he had proven to be one of the few people who actually were either quick enough to keep up with his ideas and/or willing enough to actually listen to him and think about what he was saying, “if I didn’t mess something up, it should also keep me from being recorded or properly remembered later”_

_“You said ‘almost everyone’?”_

_“Well, it certainly won’t work on you, we’re too close for that, and it might also not work on the rest of the team since they know me in person as well”_

_“And you’ve chosen to wear it like that because you’re missing the gyre you had to wear?”_

_“Of course”, Loki had deadpanned with a slightly bitter expression but that had been gone by the time he went on, “I did get used to that thing though so I figured that wearing this in its place wouldn’t really make a difference and I could just wear it constantly as well. It would make things easier”, he’d concluded and moved closer to his lover again, “apart from the fact that purple’s not really my color either and it’s less annoying there.”_

_“I think it suits you like that just fine”, Tony slid his hand down Loki’s bare side and leg until his fingers came across the smooth fabric, “if you’re really alright with this, I don’t see why we shouldn’t give it a shot”_

 

That’s how Tony and the rest of the Avengers had been introduced to, what they now simply referred to as Loki’s ‘bling’ as no one except him managed to remember its actual name for longer than five minutes even if they wrote it down and it didn’t really come up that often in conversation either.

The most important thing was that Loki could move about in public more or less in peace when he chose to. The only downside of the talisman consisted in people not only not recognizing him and thus treating him like any other person but sometimes also not even noticing his presence or forgetting what he’d said or asked for if they’d turned their back to him once.

Shapeshifting sometimes actually was the easier thing to do, especially if he needed to interact with someone more than once. That had been the main reason why he’d accompanied Tony to France as a woman instead of just using the stone as he’d not really been keen on being treated like a ghost during their stay and now, he was sitting cross-legged in the rocking chair in their living room in front of the huge windows, holding their baby to his chest so her head was resting against his shoulder and kept smoothing the tips of his fingers over her back in a slow circle-motion.

Now, the ribbon sat on his nightstand and beside it laid a second band, identical to Loki’s in every aspect but its size as it was a lot smaller. Both, he and Tony, had thought it best to already have prepared a way for her to be able to be in public, or at least out of the tower, without drawing any special attention to herself. They didn’t know if they’d end up using it yet but it was there and that fact made it easier for both of them to relax; one thing less to worry about right now.

He’d just fed Rose and currently waited for her to doze off again while he was quietly singing to her. Today’s song was one of the old nursery rhymes his own mother had used to sing to him when he’d been little.

“That’s it, sweetheart”, he whispered when his daughter finally seized squirming and quietened down, her muscles going slack, “that’s it”

He allowed himself a sigh then and let his head fall back against the rocker’s backrest, careful not to move about too much and wake her up after all. She had barely slept at all during the previous night and therefore he had not either. Although that might also had had something to do with Tony calling and telling him that he would not make it back home that day.

What’s more important, however, was this: One thing that could happen when a child was conceived due to magic or charms was that mother and child sometimes ended up sharing a stronger bound, resulting in the mother being able to always feel whether their child was fine or in distress. That bound usually weakened over the years and once the child had grown up, it had usually boiled down to a general sense of unease on the side of the mother, should their child be unwell or in danger.

At first, this had resulted in Loki getting up and teleporting to Rose’s side before she’d even started crying but eventually, he’d stopped doing that. The main reason for that had been that he, deep down, knew full well that you weren’t supposed to come fuss over a child before they even knew something was wrong themselves.

Tony had also told him not to do that anymore, because of that and also because it meant that Loki was doing everything on his own and subsequently didn’t get any more rest than their newborn daughter who had been sleeping for two hours at a time tops until now. With him allowing Tony to help and take care of her when she cried in the middle of the night half the time, he could at least try and get a little more sleep once he knew that she was fine.

The rocker had almost stopped moving and Loki now carefully untangled one leg from underneath himself and kicked his foot against the floor to make it swing back and forth again and let his leg dangle over the edge of the seat afterwards, closing his eyes for a while.

“And you said you didn’t want one of those”, came an amused voice from the door at some point and Loki made a vague gesture as if he was waving Tony’s statement away without opening his eyes.

“It is one of the more useful inventions your planet has to offer”

Loki counted about seven steps Tony made until he stood right in front of him and Rosie.

“Told you so”

This close up, Loki smelled the shampoo Tony had used earlier and he slowly blinked at him when his spouse lifted the baby out of his arms and kissed the top of his head before he carried her out of the room to lay her down in her crib.

“You look good”, Tony stated once he’d stepped back in front of him a short while later. During the last hours he had been dying to get back to his spouse earlier but he still couldn’t bring himself to just put Rose down and leave straight away. He was pretty sure that Loki could get behind that though.

“I know”, another slow blink and Tony laughed as he tugged at the god’s hands and pulled him to his feet.

“I really tried to come back by yesterday evening, I’m sorry”

S.H.I.E.L.D. required him and the rest of the team to go through the reports of their accomplished missions with another agent every few months and that always felt like it took years instead of hours. With the chaos the whole Pierce-affair, Steve reuniting with his world-war-two-sweetheart Bucky Barnes and insisting that he stayed with him at the tower, along with Sam new on the team had caused – never mind Tony and Loki leaving Midgard and staying on Asgard for more than half a year – though, it had taken even longer this time, all in all almost two whole days to be more precise, and Tony had come this close to physically strangling Phil Coulson.

“It’s fine, love”, Loki promised in a soft voice and his lover couldn’t help himself but smile at that; ‘ _love_ ’. One of the things he had not expected when he’d actually gotten to know the god,  had been that he would be fond of using pet names such as ‘love’ or ‘darling, dearest, honey, sweetheart’ (although he now usually used the last one for their daughter, not Tony) and he loved it, adored the fact that Loki, who had spent half his life building himself a façade of self-control and blaze neutrality allowed himself to cast all of that painfully earned indifference in the wind and just felt comfortable enough with Tony to be openly sweet with him without being ashamed of it.

No one had yet dared to try and make Loki take part in that bureaucratic ritual but a number of bets had been placed on what exactly the trickster would do to the poor soul who might have to try it one day.

“Like I’ve said, today was alright”, Loki pulled one hand out of his lover’s grip to rub his eyes but then smiled back at him, “she actually slept a little”

“Yeah, I saw that”, Tony guided Loki’s hands upwards and laid them down on his own shoulders before he placed his on Loki’s hips, “did I miss anything?”

“I would have called you straight away, you know that, Tony”, the god rubbed his thumbs over his collarbones at his anxious tone of voice and softly kissed his lips, pulling him closer and breathing in his smell.

As much as Tony was still worried that his boyfriend would end up making himself sick with the way he wanted to do everything, including taking care of their baby, by himself, he was also scarred beyond belief that he would miss too much of Rose’s growing up, despite the fact that that would, according to Loki and Frigga, take at the very least twice as long a human child’s would, even longer if she took after Loki and developed the same abilities he had and the chances for that were almost astronomically high.

“I know”, Tony confirmed with a slightly exasperated huff that was more directed at himself than the god, “it’s just that… forget it, I’m being angsty”

“I noticed that”, Loki chuckled and halfheartedly attempted to weasel out of his lover’s hold and avoid the fingers he prodded his side with, “you’d like me to do anything about that?”

“’m not really in the mood for doing anything fast enough to have finished and gotten cleaned up after by the time she’s woken up again”     

“How…”, Loki raised one eyebrow, “very _thoughtful_ of you”

“It’s sad, isn’t it?”

“Then we’ll do something almost as good”

“Huh”, Tony made when his boyfriend slung both arms around his neck and laid his forehead against his.

“Jarvis”, he then asked, after Tony too had tightened his hold around his hips and pulled him just as close as he could manage, “would you put on something very cheesy please?”

And Jarvis did.

“Are you serious?”, Tony huffed at the AI but let himself be led by his lover, who slowly started spinning them around when the first notes of George Michael’s ‘Careless Whisper’ started playing.

“You can choose the next song as long it’s neither ACDC nor Black Sabbath”, Loki promised and Tony thought about making a snarky remark but decided against it; this _was_ sweet and he saw no actual reason for being a jerk and bitching about a song;  

“Then we’ll do it properly at least”, he slid up his hands again to rearrange Loki’s until they each had one on Loki’s hip, the other ones’ fingers locked and stretched them out at the height of their shoulders.

“What, you’re going to count out loud as well?”, Loki grinned when Tony stepped forward with his right foot und he followed, swinging them around a little more than was strictly necessary but more fun.

“Says the one who can’t keep his back straight”

Tony swayed them this way and that before he let go with one hand, they broke apart and he twirled Loki around once, twice before he caught him again and they continued dancing, after a couple of minutes they spent doing nothing but making out of and threading their fingers through each other’s hair course.

No, people weren’t shocked when they found out that Tony Stark could dance but chances are, most of them didn’t expect him to twirl the god of fire and mischief around their living room until their daughter would wake up again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really hope you've enjoyed this and thank you if you read the whole things through - Let me know if you liked it and lots of love!
> 
> By the way I may or may not continue adding some bonus chapters from time to time but this chapter marks the "offical end" of this fic, bonus chapters will be, as their name says, additions to the story and it'll be up to you if you'll want to read them or not, they'll also probably be shorter than my usual chapters.


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